This power seems a might screwed-up. I found a comment by Goff on the old mailing list, but it seemed even more wrong. The power is found on pages 57-58 of the Book of the Dead.

If I'm reading this correctly, it seems that each level of the power gives you that number of extra action cards when the power is invoked. The scale also includes how many times you can call upon the power in a round. The power itself takes one action card. So this is the regular chart:

What's even more confusing: If the Harrowed invokes his Unholy Reflexes (at level 3, for example) on the 9 of Clubs, and his new cards are 6 of Spades, 8 of Hearts, 10 of Hearts and Queen of Diamonds, what happens to the 10 and the Queen? Both have already been called this round! Are they to be used immediately (on the 9 of Clubs), are they discarded or does one (or more) of them become a cheat card up your sleeve? If it becomes a sleeve card, what if you already have one?

And let's face the following situation: If the Harrowed with Unholy Reflexes 5 gets 5 cards in a round plus 1 sleeve card, and his cards for the round include the Red Joker and the Ace of Spades, then he can invoke Unholy Reflexes for his maximum of three times before anyone has a decent chance of doing something, gaining himself a total of 18(!) actions for the round!

Is this correct?

"If you think I'm crazy, you should see the people I'm locked up with." - Steamdriven

Noshrok Grimskull wrote:What's even more confusing: If the Harrowed invokes his Unholy Reflexes (at level 3, for example) on the 9 of Clubs, and his new cards are 6 of Spades, 8 of Hearts, 10 of Hearts and Queen of Diamonds, what happens to the 10 and the Queen? Both have already been called this round! Are they to be used immediately (on the 9 of Clubs), are they discarded or does one (or more) of them become a cheat card up your sleeve? If it becomes a sleeve card, what if you already have one?

The usual way this is handled (such as by the extra action card Hexes) is that if you don't have a sleeve card, you can sleeve one of the "already called" cards. Any others are lost.

That seems a bit unsatisfying if you're using a power like this though. I'd probably allow them all to be used simultaneously. Though that is also scary.

EDIT 2: Actually now that I think about it, the most elegant fix for this would be to simply add the word "next" to the power. As in, you get the extra action cards in your NEXT round. That neatly ties up any ordering problems, though it means the benefits of the power are less immediate. You have to use action cards in your first round for extra actions in the next.

And let's face the following situation: If the Harrowed with Unholy Reflexes 5 gets 5 cards in a round plus 1 sleeve card, and his cards for the round include the Red Joker and the Ace of Spades, then he can invoke Unholy Reflexes for his maximum of three times before anyone has a decent chance of doing something, gaining himself a total of 18(!) actions for the round!

Is this correct?

That's a bit of an extreme example, but yes. That's the way I read it.

Beware of Stone, who has 3 or 5 levels of this and supernatural levels of Quickness.

EDIT: The reason I'm asking is because I wanted to make a "normal" (meaning no magical abilities) character for Hell On Earth. However, when I drew for him, I ended up with the double-joker draw: Harrowed (luckily, red joker on the second pull).

So I decided to go whole hog and pull out Book of the Dead to take the 5 points of Hindrances and give him the 10 points of Harrowed powers. Of course, wanting to make a "normal" character, I didn't want any fancy magical crap. So I poured everything into Supernatural Trait.

This, however, coupled with the Veteran o' the Weird West Edge (+25 bounty at chargen and MORE Harrowed Power points) meant that I ended up with a character who has 3d12+10 Deftness and 4d12+4 Quickness.

I thought that 4d12+6 Quickness would be a bit overboard, so that's when I looked at Unholy Reflexes and realized that if I took the one level I could afford with my two remaining Harrowed Powers points, I'd get... well, nothing.

"So we'll smear vanishing cream all over the naked indian, sneak into the passenger car, and steal the Heart of Darkness from Stone. The chihuahah will serve as a distraction."

RedFox wrote:I thought that 4d12+6 Quickness would be a bit overboard, so that's when I looked at Unholy Reflexes and realized that if I took the one level I could afford with my two remaining Harrowed Powers points, I'd get... well, nothing.

You could take Arcane Protection instead of Unholy Reflexes... and as a reasoning, perhaps your character is so set in their ways of avoiding the supernatural, it's manifested itself as an actual barrier that causes magic and such to fizzile out... And the Character doesn't even realize it

I'm a bit confused here. It's been a while since I've looked through Book of the Dead, but here's what my understanding of the power was. You make your Quickness roll and, assuming you don't go bust, you draw your cards. At levels one and two, you get to draw one additional card, two at three and four, and three at five. Certainly I can't see how having this power at level one can be considered completely useless.

Sitting Duck wrote:I'm a bit confused here. It's been a while since I've looked through Book of the Dead, but here's what my understanding of the power was. You make your Quickness roll and, assuming you don't go bust, you draw your cards. At levels one and two, you get to draw one additional card, two at three and four, and three at five. Certainly I can't see how having this power at level one can be considered completely useless.

Not quite right, Duck. The power itself has a Speed of 1, so you need an action to activate it (therefore, you can't use it until after you have your cards). At Level 1 & 2, you get to use the power once per round. At Level 3 & 4, twice per round. And at Level 5, three times per round. Every use gives you a number of Action Cards equal to your Level in the power.
Therefore, with only 1 level in Unholy Reflexes, you spend 1 Action Card to gain 1 Action Card. Not very efficient.

"If you think I'm crazy, you should see the people I'm locked up with." - Steamdriven

I'd personally look at handling this power another way entirely, probably adding +2 per level to your Quickness rolls (stackable with Supernatural Trait: Quickness btw) and allow you to exceed the limit of 5 cards by one for every level you have in this power.